Working with Sr Devs - Caution! They must [want to] believe in Bubble!

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This is my opinion and likely not the opinion of many but I would like to hear from those that have similar experiences.

My [first] Tip: Make sure if you hire a developer to help with a Bubble.io app, they have an open mind and want to believe that Bubble.io can do all things.

First off, I am a huge believer in Bubble.io! I am not a developer by trade but am technical. I won’t get into my background but I have been using Bubble.io for a couple of years now and I can pretty much say that it can do whatever it is you need done. You just have to figure out the best way to do it.
Another Tip: Always try to use Bubble’s built in functionality to accomplish whatever it is you want to accomplish and if you cannot, then and on then, code it.
My Sr Dev person is an amazing developer. Super Smart and really creative and does great work. But I did not vet his desire to work in a low-code\no-code platform prior to bringing him onto a project I had already started. I was able to spin up a working functional POC within a few weeks which included end-to-end functionality, cc links, API calls to SaaS and many other bells and whistles. Now, months later, things are so not bubble’esque that I really have no idea what is going on and shitz broke honestly.
Another Tip: Don’t over complicate things… KISS!!!
We have calls that run in the workflow as a Do Once which calls a function that was ran when the page was loaded to get the true or false value so that when the action in the app occurs it does [this] or [that] depending on the result which results in many other functions like this. I know you think I am exagerating but if I run in Step-by-Step debug mode from initial login to just where it loads the dashboard, it will literally take me 3+ minutes of clicking Next in order for it to finish logging in. I mean come on! And all of this costs precious time and load on the app - it has to.
I am going to step off of my soap box as I am sure some of you have been here before and others are likely in agreement with my Sr Dev but if there is one thing I can leave you with, it is: trust bubble and believe in it. It will work and handle your needs and if you ever have to hire more resources, make sure they want to believe in and use a low-code\no-code solution such as bubble.
BTW, I have created 3 other sites using Bubble and they are working fine without all of the extra external fluff.

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You got a traditional dev to try to build in a no-code environment, and were surprised that they built it traditioanlly?

Have you tried adding a breakpoint on the action?

It feels like your grievance is with traditional developers joining Bubble projects, not senior Bubble developers…

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I’ve seen it countless times where clients hire upwork traditional devs for their bubble projects and the optimization is REALLY bad or they say they just can’t accomplish things that in reality are simple tasks in bubble.

The best devs you’re going to find here are developers that have a few years or more of bubble experience AND traditional experience, granted you’re going to be paying $100+/hour but they can typically accomplish things far faster and better than junior devs.

I’ve also seen projects that clients hired a junior bubble dev with a year or two of experience and no traditional experience paying $40/hr and by the time the base is built they told me they were 10k in and I could’ve built the simple app at roughly half the cost even at my typical $120/hour.

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100% right! I guess I assumed that many Sr Bubble Developers started as traditional developers. I think that assumption is likely wrong.

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As someone who considerers themselves (and is considered by others as) a senior Bubble developer, I can’t agree with this at all…

Bubble is great for a lot of things… and completely unsuited to other things… (although it can probably do most things if you really stretch it, many things are just totally impractical to do with Bubble, at least in a scalable, performant, cost-effective way, no matter how much you want to believe that’s not the case).

The WORST possible thing you can get is a ‘Dev’ who believes (or wants to believe) that Bubble can do all things.

In fact, I’ve seen the (often dire) consequences of that too many times.

A good (and honest) dev, should know the capabilities, and limitations, of Bubble (or whatever platform/tech-stack they’re using) and be confident and capable enough to know when something either is outside the practical limits of the platform, and requires custom code solutions - or is totally beyond the practical capabilities of the platform (even with custom code solutions).

A Bubble dev convinced that Bubble can do ALL things (when it definitely can’t) is a recipe for disaster (and disgruntled clients).

Although it’s also true that (as has been expressed here already) a trad-dev who doesn’t know Bubble can be just as bad as a Bubble dev who thinks Bubble can do everything (I’ve seen both sides of this, and neither one bodes well for the outcome of the app).

Bubble can certainly do many things, and is a great platform to work with - but what you need is a Bubble dev who truly understands the capabilities AND limitation of Bubble, who knows how to work WITHIN the Bubble platform AND how to use code and/or external service as and when required.

And also who knows when Bubble simply isn’t the right tool for the job, and isn’t afraid to say so (not one who just wants to believe no matter what).

A true ‘senior’ dev will do that (whereas many junior devs will convince themselves, and you, that Bubble can do ‘all’ things, and end up creating a tangled mess of impractical Bubble logic, APi integrations, and non-sensical custom-code to try to make things work in Bubble which would be much better suited to other methods of development).

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Thank you so much for your input @adamhholmes ! Your opinion is one I really respect and I think you hit the nail on the head. There is a middle ground for sure. My post came from frustration because I am experiencing the traditional dev that does not want to give bubble any credit so he is at one end of the spectrum and I am likely all the way over at the other end of the spectrum when in reality, we should be meeting somewhere in the middle.
Thanks again @adamhholmes for taking time to respond!

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Adam, this post is golden and can save many business owners hours of grief and tens of thousands of dollars…

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Believing or not in Bubble is not the topic. I guess most of all have been in IT for long enough to have multiple tools in our pockets - and Bubble is just one of them.

The job of the senior developer is to find the most suitable solution to the use-case based on client’s priorities, including maintenance.

Sometimes you may use Bubble, sometimes you may use another solution.

Now if the developer advices other solution because of lack of proficiency…well, that’s another story.

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It’s basically the midwit meme where the clueless guy is just like “let’s build almost everything in native bubble” (poorly) and the really smart guy is like “let’s build almost everything in native bubble” (robustly) while the midwit thinks “no Bubble sucks for everything you need to always use 3rd party solutions and plugins.”

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@adamhholmes :100: - Just for some seasonal fun, here is how to hide an Element

function myFunction() {
  var x = document.getElementById("myDIV");
  if (x.style.display === "none") {
    x.style.display = "block";
  } else {
    x.style.display = "none";
  }
}

For anyone reading this - it is Bubble joke - do not do this!

But it is not really a joke because I would guess we have all seen similar nonsense in Bubble projects. Apologies @keri - not making light of your situation, you are not alone in having to unpick poor Code vs Bubble implementation decisions. (it goes both ways)

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@lindsay_knowcode No offense taken at all. That “joke” is hilarious and I bet it, or something similar, exists in my app today! I am really enjoying the conversation and seeing everyone’s opinions.

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Probably the senior Devs that believe in Bubble the most are those that started pre-funding, while Bubble was still bootstrapped. Nothing says true believer like an early adopter who is still building with bubble today.

And I might just dare to say, a level up is the early adopter who started as non-technical, as they needed to truly believe in bubble to start as a non-technical person as everything technical was new to them.

One up from there are those who started to learn a thing or two about more technical things like custom CSS, JavaScript , database structuring, APIs etc, due to their experiences with Bubble.